The present disclosure relates to an electrophotographic image forming apparatus that performs an image formation with use of toner.
In an image forming apparatus, generally, an electrostatic latent image formed on an image carrier such as a photoconductor drum is visualized by developer in a developing device, and the visualized image is transferred to a recording medium. At this time, some toner may not be transferred to the recording medium and remain on the surface of the photoconductor drum. The remnant toner is removed from the surface of the photoconductor drum by a cleaning device, and is collected, as waste toner, in a waste toner collection container. The waste toner is conveyed to a predetermined position by a screw in the horizontal direction parallel to the photoconductor drum. A conveyance duct is disposed at the predetermined position, and the waste toner is introduced into the conveyance duct and conveyed by another screw in the conveyance duct to the waste toner collection container.
Meanwhile, toner is likely to be scattered in the developing device. As a result, when an air pressure inside the developing device is higher than an air pressure outside thereof, tonner scattered inside the developing device may leak to the outside. When toner leaks to outside of the developing device, inside and outside of the image forming apparatus may be contaminated by the toner. To prevent this, conventionally, a suction nozzle is provided in the vicinity of the developing device such that scattered toner is sucked by a fan and trapped by a filter, thereby restricting the toner from being scattered in the peripheral of the developing device.